Living the Live in the tradition of Advaita Vedanta

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Month: January 2013

Q: How do I know my current ‘spiritual path ‘ is the right one for me?

A: What is holding your special attention in Life right now. It can be anything.

Q: Anything?

A: Something that asks your special interest, this week, today, now. It may seem trivial, but come up with it.

Sweden (Photo credit: loops)

Q: Well there’s always my work, my husband, my children…

A: No, these parts of your life ask your attention already for a longer time and will remain a while. I mean something trivial. It can be small but for now it fills up your time for some reason.

Q: We are planning a holiday to Sweden. A while ago I found a novel from a swedish writer in a second-hand bookstore. Somehow it draw my attention and I decided to buy it. Think it reminded me of my grandmother. She always was into books with unfolding stories about the lives of people in Scandinavia. The actual idea of traveling to Sweden first came up while I was caught by the impression the novel made upon me.

A: That is a good example. Do you have other connections to people in the north?

Q: Not really. I once went to Copenhagen, but further north I’ve never been. I have no friends or relatives there. Besides a visit to IKEA now and then, oh and a former boyfriend had a Volvo, I can’t find any connection.

A: Ok, a very good example. Thank you for that. Usually we are urged to mention the more intense and difficult parts of our lives that seem to take large chunks of our time. We often somehow embrace them because we grow stronger and learn from them. The smaller, more trivial life-encounters we call coincidences, sidesteps. Actually that makes them so interesting! Yes, a trip to Sweden could turn into a major event in your life! So unexpected.

What else do you notice now ‘ Sweden’ grabs your attention? Do you dream about it, do you watch swedish movies?

Q: Well, I suddenly meet people who have been there, a college of mine has a SAAB, and on the internet I came into contact with a guy who used to live there. Even the swedish-meatballs in a cooking-show got my sudden attention.

Q: Well, yes, but to be honest, what has this all to do with my quest for the right spiritual path?

A: Everything!

Sweden has found You! You might meet a thousand trivial things a day in Life. All the commercial ads on billboards, tv, the subway, tv, magazines. They try to get your attention. The same is with each article in a store, a robe a fellow passenger is wearing in the train, the music you hear in a shopping mall. But also a passing butterfly in a meadow, the little dog barking on the corner of a street. And from all the millions of possibilities you picked up a swedish novel!

A: Everything.The teacher, your teacher will find You! He or she is like the swedish writer. He or she wrote a novel, and now this work has impact on your life! Listen, from a million books in the stores, this particular novel came into your hands and is already infecting your Life!

So small, and oh so touching. Stop worrying about your spiritual life. THIS IS ALL YOU. The Swedish novel is YOU. So is there anything that is outside YOU? Your view of a devotee sitting in front of his guru might be a more acceptable view of how to take part in the race for enlightenment. And I can assure you, the Guru will find you when the time is right! For now Sweden it is. Next time you will be caught by the poster of a well-known violin-player, in front of the Berliner Symphony-orchestra. And so Life will unfold itself to you. Give it the attention it needs.

Lately my Life got a bit much cluttered by packing things, sorting stuff and moving to a new house. So to all of you that have been waiting for some new masterpiece of my creative no mind, its time to pick things up again with a new drive. ” There is so much ignorance out there to give some attention in this New Year, that I don’t know how to start.”

In fact there is no ignorance at all. Basically as an idea we just take the stand of the ignorant identification, what we call a person. It is this separation, this cut of from the whole that let us feel isolated. This is what we do. All the time and in every moment of our Life’s, even during the happy moments of the day, it is the idea of being a person amongst all other objects in a space we call universe that needs to be realised and thus known as into a truthful perspective.

For a New Year, a real invention on its own, I wish you all this Knowledge that in basically it is just pure Joy. An everlasting Moment of Love and Understanding with no beginning and no end.